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Blueberry Pancakes–Muffin (and Everyone Else) Approved!

Pancakes…I want some pancakes…and berries that are bluuuuuuuuuuuuuue. Zum Zum! Can you tell that I’ve seen some episodes of Backyardigans way too many times? After yesterday’s excursion to Fresh by Brookshire’s (I guess I could just call it Fresh), Muffin ate half of the pint of blueberries. In one sitting. Half. I managed to stop him from eating the rest by promising to make blueberry pancakes this morning.

Waiting for my mom (who may or may not be reading this) to stop cringing. She’s not the biggest fan of blueberries or blueberry pancakes. I think my sister may have made some one time that she liked. Other than that, uh uh.

Pancakes have always been kind of a disappointment for me. Crepes I like. I love crepes. And if you need a fool-proof recipe, read Dining on a Dime for more information. It’s kinda my food bible. But pancakes always feel kinda…clunky…in my tummy. Not happy-full (which very few things make me happy-full–Olive Garden food does, my late great-aunt Doris’s chicken and green chilies soup with Teddy Allen cornbread, my sister’s chicken and dumplins, my mom’s pretty much anything (especially her pizza), Josh’s lasagna, his mom’s–Oma’s recipe–for meatloaf, and my grandmother’s beef veg soup). Happy-full is a condition where you aren’t heavy full but have a warmth in your belly where you aren’t hungry but don’t have an overfull sharp full either. Yes. I know. I’m crazy like that.

So, I’ve always been in search of the perfect pancakes recipe. I’ve tried Bisquick and milk. I’ve tried Dining on a Dime–crepes yes, pancakes no. I’ve tried Miss Kay’s cookbook which are okay, but still awfully clunky in my belly. So I did what I normally do. Went to the-site-formerly-known-as-Recipezaar (Food.com) and searched for Blueberry Pancakes. I don’t have bananas, so half of the recipes went out the window. I don’t keep buttermilk and didn’t really feel like hunting down the vinegar to make buttermilk. I found a recipe to make pancakes with lemon juice and milk (basically another way of making buttermilk), but the recipe didn’t seem quite right. Plus, I had limes but no lemons. Then, I realized something: I keep trying to make the pancakes taste like McDonald’s. McDonald’s pancakes taste sweet. Most recipes that I’ve used call for 2 tablespoons of sugar. So I changed the recipe completely. And we served it with Brookshire’s thick slicked bacon that we also cooked on the griddle (well, Josh cooked it on the griddle).

My plate of blueberry pancakes on my blueberry plate! 🙂

My New Version of Buttermilk Blueberry Pancakes

2 cups milk

1 juicy lime, juiced (a smaller regular lime, not a key lime, and not the large limes)

2 cups flour, measured using the scoop-and-sweep method (Sometimes, like today, I cheat and use my finger to sweep)

3 tablespoons sugar (although I almost wondered what brown sugar would do to the pancakes–I may try that next time)

2 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt plus one pinch

1 large egg

3 tablespoons butter, melted and cooled (zapped in the microwave for 30 seconds then stuck in the fridge while gathering the rest of the ingredients)

1 cup blueberries (fresh), enough to have 6-8 blueberries per pancake with a few left over for Muffin to eat the rest with his pancakes

Juice the lime into a measuring cup with the two cups of milk. Take a big sniff of the lime halves and enjoy the freshness. Ahhh. You know you want to! Whisk together. Let the milk sit, sour, and thicken (becoming buttermilk-like) while you prep the rest of the ingredients. Whisk a few more times while waiting so it thickens but doesn’t become clumpy. In a large mixing bowl (like the ceramic ones that I had the chips in at the Super Bowl party), whisk together the dry ingredients (using a separate whisk than the one for the milk so the mixture stays dry).

Whisk butter into milk (just to be on the safe side add it before the egg so the egg has more protection from curdling) and add the egg, whisking until combined and foamy (just for fun).

Make a well in the dry ingredients. Pour the wet carefully into the dry and stir until just combined but lumpy (If you are like me and this is the point where you make bread dough and realize you only poured in one cup of milk to mix with the lime juice add the extra cup of milk and stir like a speed demon).

Heat a griddle laced with nonstick spray to 350 degrees. Place batter in 1/4 cup circles on the griddle (ours holds six with nothing else on it, four with a few pieces of bacon on it). Immediately sprinkle blueberries in a spread out pattern on each wet side of pancake (the face up side). Once large bubbles form on the surface of the pancake, turn the pancakes. Josh does this part, otherwise we have scrambled pancake–very scary, trust me.

When the “blueberried” side is done, evacuate the pancakes to a serving plate and slather (or dot) with butter. Place the plate in an oven heated to 190 degrees to stay warm while you prep the next few batches. Repeat until all of the batter is used up. Serve drizzled with warmed maple syrup, pancake syrup, blueberry syrup, or sister syrup (one day I will post the recipe for it).

Verdict: I let Josh taste them first in case a bit of lime twang was off putting. He was pleasantly surprised and had wondered what I had put lime in. I don’t have the clunky full feeling. I ate two and feel fine. Maybe even a bit happy full. Muffin devoured the rest of the blueberries (a few tablespoons) with his slice of bacon and one pancake (I have a feeling that his other slice of bacon and pancake will be eaten later).